Kunal sent me this link to the Inversion House, an incredibly cool work of form by two opportunistic artists:
This extraordinary structure on Montrose Boulevard took motorists by surprise. A pair of artists, Dan Havel and Dean Ruck was responsible for this house installation. The two wooden buildings were to be replaced by a new built project, so the few months before the demolition they turned them into an architectonic installation.
There’s two things that hit me: 1) it’s interesting how such a massive area (the front) gets turned into a tiny jutting tunnel on the opposite side and 2) it totally reminds me of some works by famed paper architect Lebbeus Woods. (”Paper architect” meaning that most of his projects are hypothetical, not that he works exclusively with paper or is himself made of paper.)
Above: Lebbeus Woods’ Havana Re-imagined, 1994.
I mean, the resemblance is superficial because those works are doing very different things… but look, lots of tiny pieces of something!
In ARTnews, “Gold Rush” (about the surge in Klimt prices):
In a New Yorker column last July, art critic Peter Schjeldahl wrote: ‘Is [Adele I] worth the money? Not yet. […] And the identity of the artist gives pause… until a few years ago, the artist ranked as a second-tier modern master.’
Oh no, “second-tier”!
Art critics, worthless posturing leaches.
Yesterday, I went down to San Diego for Comic Con, the world’s biggest comic convention yadda yadda. I’ve got nothing against comics—in fact, I rather like the web and manga variety—but as far as U.S. comics go I’m pretty clueless. So, I spent a lot of time randomly wandering around, collecting free things and watching geeks.
Observations?
- There are lots and lots of people who are very, very good at drawing things. Alf and I dropped by one booth, Design Studio Press, full of ridiculously talented Art Center College of Design students and instructors showing off their books. It was pretty sobering.
- American comic posters (generally speaking) get kind of boring after a while. A lot of them have extravagantly drawn characters in flashy dynamic or dramatic poses. Because they’re so uniformly flashy/dynamic/oversaturated/laborously drawn they start to look a bit flat. It’d be a nice to see some variety, may be throw in some relatively understated stuff.
- Geeks are damn horny. The evidence is… abundant. I mean, yeah, you’ve got your asexual geeks, but they’re definitely in the minority.
- Comic Con is a b.o farm. In the exhibit hall, which is practically wall-to-wall bodies, sweaty fellow’s unique musk gets added together a couple dozen thousand times over under the lack of a God is readily affirmed.
- Geeks are a whiney lot. I don’t know if it’s because complaining makes for an easy conversation or what, but damn does your average geek love to do it. (Although, to be fair, it’s not like there was a lack of things to complain about.)
- There were lots of artists/writers/etc. around looking to give out autographs, and not a lot of takers. Generally, it seemed that people swarmed the popular figures and left the rest to rot. I felt bad, but I guess that’s the way it goes.
- Mackenzie totally doesn’t sound like the way she sounds when I’m reading her blog.
- It’s weird to see the cartoonists behind the comics I read on the web (Lesnick of Girly, Tycho & Gabe of Penny Arcade, etc.) just sitting around. Lesnick didn’t have a lot of traffic and looked kind of bored; Tycho & Gabe had a freakin’ line that wrapped around their booth, plus staff selling a bunch of their crap. T & G, incidentally, are both bald pasty white dudes.
- The S. Korean government has an agency that promotes Korean manga and anime, and which had a hefty booth at Comic Con. They even staffed it with a rather bored-looking Korean lady wearing some big-ass frilly blue dress costume. That’s pretty cool; all the U.S. g’ment promotes is itself and its guns.
On the way back, I fought valiantly to stay the fuck awake. I turned up the music, turned up the a/c, slapped myself, sang loudly, drank a bottle of water… and finally, turned the radio to KIIS. That did the trick.
Museums tiring? Here’s some suggestions on how to give a crap about art:
- Emotional Response. If you’ve ever wondered why Raphael’s School of Athens, Picasso’s Guernica, and a crucifix in a jar of urine are all called “art,” it’s because the purpose of “art” is to invoke emotion. It’s something that tries to make you feel, partially by giving you the feeling. That’s what all those works are looking to do. This is the root of the easiest way to appreciate art: study it and ask yourself, “does this do anything for me?” Do you feel admiration? disgust? sadness? outrage? sympathy? As far as you’re concerned, art that doesn’t inspire a reaction bad art, at least for now.
- Contextual Appreciation. Art is evidence of an artist’s life and the time and place within which it was created. If know/care about these things than you’ll probably care more about the art, too. Audioguides, tours, and books help a lot here; jogging through the museum glancing at everything doesn’t.
- Technical Appreciation. This is a rough route to go unless you’re actually an artist, in an allied field, or otherwise have some kind of experience with the process that went into an artwork. If you do, then you can admire a painter’s technique, a sculpture’s skill, a performance artist’s insanity, etc. For some reason, a lot of people with the idea that “art appreciation” = “looking for something in the artwork” go this route, and then they get bored when they don’t find it.
Lastly, don’t try to appreciate every single piece of art in a museum, unless the museum is the size of your living room. When you go to a library, you don’t try to read every book, right?
Pandering and Popularity
As the artists, musicians, directors, and the like get more popular they’re usually accused of “pandering” or “selling out” to, presumably, the “masses.” The implication is that the artist is somehow compromising his original intent for the sake of getting more fans, money, or whatever.
I think this accusation comes from a simmering blend of two things:
The first fear is perhaps founded, but it sure as hell can’t be helped. No one lives in a vacuum—artists are going to be influenced by their own popularity, other artists, and their own fans whether they want to or not. They’re not compromising their “vision” because their vision is changing along with them. At most, they’re compromising your vision.
The second is basically an unjustified variant of “their old stuff was better”-syndrome. People get uncomfortable when the things they like get too popular, because they perceive popularity as diminishing their uniqueness. Yet, it’s not the artist’s responsibility to stay unknown; it’s silly to hate an artist for being popular because, if they’re really that good, then it’s a good thing for more people to share in their talent.
Penny Arcade’s Jerry Holkins addresses pandering this way:
My point is that whether or not “pandering” is consciously occurring, it’s not something to complain about, simply because there’s no alternative. Protesting compromise or popularity is fruitless. The creator’s changed and what s/he makes is going to change with it.